Pause To Reflect

         Year's end marks new beginnings and a time for us to pause and reflect.

Below you will find a collection of inspirational quotes, proverbs and some of my own sayings that can be used for self-reflection and introspection. It is never a waste of time to self-reflect. In fact, the practice of looking inward rather than outward is a must for those who are committed to their personal growth.

As you read on, take a step back, pause, and give careful thought to your life, behavior, and beliefs.

Who knows, perhaps one or more of these sayings might be exactly what you need to get a fresh perspective and start the new year on a good note.

Year's end. New start. Time for reflection.

Give serious thought to life

One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: That word is love. - Sophocles

A miracle is a shift in perception.  - A Course In Miracles

What poison is to food, self-pity is to life. - Oliver C. Wilson

Time (and personal energy) is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have. Be careful lest someone else spend it for you. - Carl Sandburg

What paralyzes life is the failure to believe and the failure to dare. - Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

You may not be getting any younger but if the best is yet to come, it will come only if invited.
 - Sam Levenson

As healthy adults, we eventually come to understand, as we play our friend, spouse, parent, family roles, the limited nature of every human relationship. - Judith Viorst

The older we get the more we need to play. - Maurice lovelace

Trials are but lessons you failed to learn, present again. - A Course In Miracles

The way out is via the door. How is it that no one will use this method. - Confucious

Often the greatest challenge isn't learning to love others. It's learning to let them love us.
 - Melody Beattie

Live with the past not in it. - Teri Sue Livingston

Look at what you've got and make the best of it. It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness. - Proverb

When life is sweet, say thank you and celebrate. When life is bitter, say thank you and grow.
 - Shauna Niequist

A stumble may prevent a fall. - Buddha

Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it. - Charles Swindoll

When something bad happens you have three choices. You can let it define you, let it destroy you, or you can let it strengthen you. - Unknown

Each morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most. - Buddha

Feelings are just visitors. let them come and go. - Mooji

It is not joy that makes us grateful. It is gratitude that makes us joyful. - David Rast

Who does not thank for little will not thank for much. - Proverb

Your pain is an opportunity for you to learn about yourself. - Gary Zukav

May your choices reflect your hopes and not your fears. - Nelson Mandela

The beautiful things about setbacks is they introduce us to our strengths. - Robin Sharma

If you truly want to change your life, you first must be willing to change your mind.
- Donald Altman

Sometimes you have to cry before you sing. - Unknown

The time is always right to do what is right. - Martin Luther King Jr.

Only people who are capable of loving strongly can suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them. - Leo Tolstoy

What we have once enjoyed deeply we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us. - Helen Keller

If it had been you that died what would you have wanted/wished for your loved one?

There are two ways of becoming stronger- one way is from pain and the other from love.
- Unknown

I love you, the most powerful words in the world. - Unknown

                             Life is all about how you choose to see things.

Careful thought about your behavior

Talk doesn't cook rice. - Chinese proverb

Just trust yourself, then you will know how to live. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

You're as sick as your secrets. - 12 step saying

Forgive all who have offended you, not for them, but for yourself. - Harriet Nelson

Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin as self-neglecting. - William Shakespeare

I venture to say that at the bottom of most fears, both mild and severe, will be found an overactive mind and an underactive body. - Dr. Henry Link

Appropriate guilt is a good motivation for change. Chronic guilt is a way to punish self and others.- Maria Spencer

Keeping our eyes on the prize means not getting sidetracked by trivia. - Gerard Vanderhaar

No longer say "yes" when you want to say "no." Your inner powers will make your success certain.- Vernon Howard

Suffering isn't ennobling, recovery is. - Christiaan N. Bernard

Nothing changes if nothing changes. - Earnie Larsen

The essence of genius is to know what to overlook. - William James

What you deny or ignore, you delay. What you accept and face, you conquer. - Robert Tew

The way you treat yourself sets the standards for others. - Sonya Friedman

You may not be able to control every situation and its outcome, but you can control how you deal with it. - Unknown

Don't wait for your feelings to change to take action. Take the action and your feelings will change.- Barbara Baron

Love is not what you say. Love is what you do. - Unknown

Letting go doesn't mean that you don't care about someone anymore. It's just realizing that the only person you really have control over is yourself. - Deborah Reber

Thinking will not overcome fear, but action will. - W. Clement Stone

Those who hate you don't win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.
- Richard Nixon

We have to laugh at the things that make us human. - Unknown

Self-neglect is an act of self-betrayal.

When those you love die, the best you can do is honor their spirit for as long as you live. You make a commitment that you're going to take whatever lesson that person or animal was trying to teach you, and you make it true in your own life. It's a positive way to keep their spirit alive in the world by keeping it alive in yourself. - Patrick Swayze

The more we embrace death and dying, the more we embrace life and living.

Waiting for someone else to make you happy is the best way to be sad. - Unknown

What goes on inside invariably shows on the outside; it's reflected in what we say and do.
- Unknown

The person who does not make a choice makes a choice. - Jewish proverb

Let mourning stop when one's grief is fully expressed. - Confucious

Grief adds depth to our life. We can grieve without becoming immobilized by it. - Unknown

What you dislike in another take care to correct in yourself. - Thomas Sprat

                  It's not the power of the past, it's the power you give the past.

Reflecting on your beliefs

Every good thought you think is contributing its share to the ultimate result of your life
 - Grenville Kleiser

He is able who thinks he is able. - Buddha

Sometimes the only closure you need is the understanding that you deserve better.
- Trent Shelton

Remember that sometimes not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.
- Dalai Lama

It isn't what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it's what we say to ourselves about what happens.- Pema Chodron

The greatest obstacle to connecting with joy is resentment. - Pema Chodron

The greatest part of our happiness or misery depends on our disposition and not on our circumstances. - Martha Washington

Trust is not a promise that good will automatically come, but that something good is somehow already present. - Christina Baldwin

I am larger, better than I thought, I did not know I held so much goodness. - Walt Whitman

We are better than we know. If we can be made to see it, maybe from now on we'll be unwilling to settle for less. - Anonymous

I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions. - Stephen Covey

When you change the way you think, you can change the way you feel. - David D. Burns

It's not who you are that holds you back; it's who you think you're not. - Unknown

Much suffering, much unhappiness arises when you take each thought that comes into your head for truth. - Eckhart Tolle

What you think of yourself is much more important than what other people think of you.
- Seneca

By talking about death we learn to live better.

Forgiveness is giving up the wish that the past could have been different. - Oprah

The thoughts we think and the words we speak create our experiences. - Louise Hay

We don't love and accept ourselves enough and this forms the basis of much human suffering.

What I believe about my myself and about my life becomes true for me. - Louise Hay

                                     How is what you believe working for you? 

Wishing you all the best for the coming year.

Thank you for reading!